3rd week of Eastertide: Psalm 49

Mortals cannot abide in their pomp;

    they are like the animals that perish. (Psalm 49:12)

Mortals cannot abide in their pomp;

    they are like the animals that perish. (Psalm 49:20)

This morning Heath read Psalm 49 to me. I know it better than most Psalms, because I teach it in Wisdom Literature. But, to hear it from another—another taken by the wonder of it; is to hear it fresh, on its own terms. That is the thing about the Word of God, the more you hear it the more mysterious and wondrous it becomes to you. And, to hear it, requires another—another voice reading it in your hearing.

Psalm 49 is a wisdom Psalm. It makes big claims, as wisdom tends to do: “Hear this, all you peoples; give ear, all inhabitants of the world, both low and high, rich and poor together. My mouth shall speak wisdom; the meditation of my heart shall be understanding. I will incline my ear to a proverb; I will solve my riddle to the music of the harp” (49:1-4). Wisdom put to a tune: “the music of the harp.” The twice repeated refrain: “Mortals cannot abide in their pomp; they are like the animals that perish” (vss 12&20-middle and end), sums up the riddle of life. That’s how wisdom works. It describes life as it is—our life is, as the wisest of mortals puts it, “fleeting”.  But, how is it that such wisdom makes its way into the Psalter—the hymnal?

The first refrain comes after wisdom’s acknowledgement that: “No ransom avails for one's life, there is no price one can give to God for it” (vs 7). But there’s a second stanza: “But God will ransom my soul from the power of Death, for he will receive me” (vs. 15). That turns the Psalm into an Easter Hymn sung by the congregation.

“But God… But God remembered Noah…” for example—good thing. The best “But God” of them all: “But God raised Jesus from the dead” (Ac 2:24). “But God…” is the Word beyond every human word. It is the Gospel. We get to the wonder of “But God…” by entering into wisdom’s observation that “mortals cannot abide in their pomp; they are like the animals that perish.” Now we speak our “Yes, but God…” Maybe better said, we sing our “But God…” in the midst of the congregation. Could there be Easter Faith without a song?